Olympic champion Shawn Johnson speaks on growth from pain in visit to Kirksville

Saturday

Oct 26, 2013 at 2:30 AM

Johnson visited Truman State University for a speaking engagement Friday night.

Jason Hunsicker @JHunsicker_KDE @jhunsicker_kde

On top of the world and at rock bottom at the same time.

It might seem impossible, and even more so for someone who had an Olympic gold medal once draped around her neck, but Olympic champion gymnast Shawn Johnson's story of success is marked by pain that seems impossible to bear, a moment where she said she believed she'd disappointed the entire planet.

She was 16 years old in that moment and had committed the apparent athletic's sin of earning a silver Olympic medal.

Johnson opened up about that and other painful moments she said have defined who she is during a speaking engagement Friday night at Truman State University's Baldwin Auditorium. During an hour-long speech and question-and-answer session she challenged the world's outlook on athletic success and said despite a society that judges accomplishments by the color of a medal, true success can only be determined from within.

"I know that if I've tried my absolute hardest, there's nothing anybody can do or give me that means more," she said.

Johnson took the crowd through three signature moments in her life, including early childhood rejection and dealing with the aftermath of her sudden decision to retire from gymnastics in 2012, just weeks before the Summer Olympics.

The speech centered on her experiences at the 2008 games in Beijing, when after posting an undefeated record in various international and U.S. championships Johnson entered as the heavy favorite to win four gold medals, including in the all-around competition.

"The consensus was unless something tragic happened, unless some devastating disappointment happened, I was to bring back four gold medals for the US of A," Johnson said. "That was my duty."

Things didn't go as planned from the start. The Americans took silver in the team competition. In the individual event competitions she took gold in the balance beam, and silver in floor exercise.

Still, she had the ultimate prize - a gold in the all-around competition - in her sights, until her American teammate Nastia Liukin mathematically clinched the top spot on the podium seconds before Johnson took the mat for her final floor performance.

"In my heart and in my eyes, I had disappointed the entire world," Johnson said. "To know that I wasn't going to walk out with a gold medal, I questioned whether I should even compete. When we're taught to win and nothing else is good enough, do you even go out and finish?"

She did finish, and turned in what she called the best floor routine of her life, adding the experience was "liberating" and "free."

"In that instant, I wasn't doing it for anybody. I was doing it for myself," she said.While she says she was proud and accepting of her performance, others weren't ready to offer praise. At the medal presentation she described a look of "pain" on the face of the man who presented her silver. In the post-event interviews the first question she received was, "So, Shawn, how does it feel to lose?"

"I look back on that and I realized even then, we are doing it all wrong. We are teaching kids, at 16, we are teaching them and even younger that getting a silver medal at the Olympic games is failure," Johnson said.

She doesn't see it that way and hopes others can learn to celebrate achievements and effort, instead of limiting praise to merely the person at the top of the pyramid.

"In all honesty, the gold medal doesn't really mean anything to me. It's not that special," she said. "That silver medal in the all-around means more to me than anything ever could. I learned more from that one day than I think I could in a lifetime."

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